The Burning Land (40 page)

Weohstan came with more horsemen, and he led them about the right flank of Steapa’s wall and ordered a charge. Steapa shouted at the wall to advance and we marched up the slight slope toward the great halls that crowned the hill. Weohstan’s men swept ahead of us and the Danes, understanding their fate, fled.

And so we took the old fort. The enemy fled downhill, a man dragging Skade’s horse by its bridle. She sat twisted in her saddle, staring at us. We did not follow. We were weary, bloodied, bruised, wounded, and amazed. Besides, there was a shield wall of Danes guarding the bridge which led to the new fort. Not all the fugitives were going to that bridge, some were swimming their horses across the deep narrow creek to reach Caninga.

The dragon was flown from the old fort’s walls and, next to it, Ælfwold’s cross. The flags announced a victory, but that victory would mean nothing unless we could capture the new fort, which, for the first time, I saw clearly.

And cursed.

FIVE

Æthelflæd joined me on the rampart. She said nothing at first, but, careless of who watched, just put her arms round me. I could feel her body trembling. My battered shield was still looped on my left arm and it covered her when I drew her close. “I thought you were dead,” she said after a while.

“Who told you that?”

“No one,” she said. “I was watching.”

“Watching? Where?”

“From the edge of the encampment,” she said calmly.

“Are you mad?” I asked angrily, and pushed her away so I could look down at her. “You wanted the Danes to capture you?”

“There’s blood all over your face,” she said, touching my cheek with a finger. “It’s dried. Was it bad?”

“Yes, but that will be far worse.” I nodded down at the new fort.

The fort was built at the foot of the hill, where the steep grassy drop leveled into a gentler slope that ended as a low ridge snaking into the marsh beside the creek. It was near low tide and I could see the intricate mudbanks where the creek melded into marsh, and I saw how Haesten had built his new fort on that last tongue of firmer ground, but then had dug a broad moat to protect the eastern wall from a frontal assault. He had made the fort into an island, three times as long as it was wide. The southern rampart stretched along the creek and was protected by the deep-water channel, the western and northern walls looked over wide flooded inlets and endless tide-haunted marshes, while the short eastern palisade, which held the
main gate and was facing us, was protected by its newly dug moat. A wooden bridge crossed the moat, but now that the last fugitives were safely across, men were dismantling it and carrying the roadway’s wide planks back into the fort. Some of the men were working in the water, which, at the center of the moat, only came to their waists. So the moat could be crossed at low tide, though that was small consolation because the difference between high and low tide here was at least twice the height of a well-grown man, which meant that when the moat was fordable the farther bank would be a steep slope of glutinous and slick mud.

The interior of the fort was crammed with buildings, some roofed with planks and others with sailcloth, but no thatch, meaning Haesten was guarding against the possibility of fire-arrows setting his stronghold alight. I guessed many of the beams and posts to make the houses had been taken from the village which had been dismantled and burned, its ruins lying to the east of the new fort where the hill’s lower slope was widest. There were scores of Danes inside the long fort, but even more were evidently living aboard their ships. Over two hundred of the high-prowed war vessels were beached high on the creek’s farther bank. Most had been dismasted and some had awnings stretched across their crutch-supported masts. Washed clothes were drying on the awnings, while in the hulls’ shadows children played in the mud or else gaped up at us. I also counted twenty-three moored ships, all of them with their masts in place and with sails furled on their yards. Every one of those moored ships had men aboard, suggesting they could be made ready for sea at a moment’s notice. I had been thinking of bringing vessels downstream from Lundene, but the evident preparedness of the moored ships suggested that any small fleet we deployed would quickly be overwhelmed.

Steapa shambled toward us. His face, so fearsome because of the taut skin and feral eyes, looked suddenly nervous as he knelt to Æthelflæd and pulled off his helmet, leaving his hair tangled. “My lady,” he said, blinking.

“Get up, Steapa,” she said.

This was a man who would take on a dozen Danes and whose
sword was feared in three kingdoms, but he was in awe of Æthelflæd. She was royalty and he was a slave’s son. “The Lady Æthelflæd,” I said imperiously, “wants you to go down the hill, cross the moat, beat down the gates, and bring the Danes out.”

For a moment he believed me. He looked alarmed, then he frowned at me, but did not know what to say.

“Thank you, Steapa,” Æthelflæd said warmly, saving Steapa from his confusion. “You won a magnificent victory! I shall make sure my father knows of your triumph.”

He brightened at that, but still stammered. “We were lucky, my lady.”

“We always seem to be lucky when you fight. How is Hedda?”

“She’s well, lady!” He beamed at her, astonished she should condescend to ask such a question. I could never remember the name of Steapa’s wife, a tiny creature, but Æthelflæd knew, and even knew the name of his son.

“Is my brother near?” Æthelflæd asked.

“He was with us in the fight,” Steapa said, “so he must be close, my lady.”

“I shall find him,” she announced.

“Not without a bodyguard,” I growled. I suspected some fugitive Danes were still in the woods.

“The Lord Uhtred thinks I’m a baby who needs protecting,” Æthelflæd told Steapa.

“He knows best, lady,” Steapa said loyally.

Æthelflæd’s horse was brought and I cupped my hands to let her mount. I ordered Weohstan and his horsemen to escort her as she rode back toward the smoke of the burning old hall, then I gave Steapa a thump on his back. It was like punching an oak tree. “Thank you,” I said.

“For what?”

“For keeping me alive.”

“You seemed to be doing well enough,” he muttered.

“I was just dying slowly,” I said, “till you came along.”

He grunted and turned to stare down at the fort. “That be a bastard,” he said. “How do we take it?”

“I wish I knew.”

“Has to be done though,” he said, almost as a question.

“And quickly,” I stressed. It had to be quick because we had our hand on the enemy’s throat, but he still had both arms free. Those arms were the savage troops harrying Mercia who had left their families and ships in Beamfleot, and many of those men valued their ships more than their families. The Danes were opportunists. They attacked where they sensed weakness, but as soon as the fighting became too hard they boarded their ships and sailed away to find feebler prey. If I destroyed this huge fleet then the crews would be stranded in Britain and, if Wessex survived, they could be hunted down and slaughtered. Haesten might be confident that Beamfleot’s new fort was impregnable, but his followers would soon be pressing him to raise our siege. In short, once the Danes ravaging Mercia knew we were a real threat and were present in real numbers, they would want to return to protect their ships and families. “Very quickly,” I added.

“So we have to cross that ditch,” Steapa said, nodding down at the moat, “and put ladders against the wall.” He made it sound simple.

“That’s my idea too,” I said.

“Jesus,” he muttered and made the sign of the cross.

Horns sounded to the north and I turned to stare across the saddle of land where the scattered corpses of men and horses still lay and where still more horsemen were appearing from the far woods. One rider was carrying a vast dragon banner, which told me the Ætheling Edward had arrived.

Alfred’s son paused outside the fort, sitting on his horse in the sunlight while servants and packhorses hurried through the gate and up to the larger of the two halls. Both halls were in disrepair. Finan, who had searched them both, joined us on the rampart and said that the halls had been used as stables. “It’ll be like living in a cesspit,” he said.

Edward still waited beyond the gate with Æthelflæd beside him. “Why isn’t he coming into the fort?” I asked.

“He has to have a throne,” Finan said, and laughed at the ex
pression on my face. “It’s true! They’ve brought him a rug, a throne, and god knows what else. An altar too.”

“He will be the next king,” Steapa said loyally.

“Unless I manage to kill the bastard while we’re crossing that wall,” I said, pointing to the Danish fort. Steapa looked shocked, then cheered up when I asked him how Alfred was faring.

“He’s as good as ever!” Steapa said. “We thought he was dying! He’s much better now. He can ride again, even walk!”

“I heard he’d died.”

“He nearly did. They gave him the last rites, but he recovered. He’s gone to Exanceaster.”

“What’s happening down there?”

Steapa shrugged. “Danes made a camp and are sitting inside it.”

“They want Alfred to pay them to leave,” I suggested. I thought of Ragnar, and imagined his unhappiness because Brida would undoubtedly be urging him to assault Exanceaster, but that burh was a hard one to attack. It lay on a hill, the approaches were steep, and Alfred’s trained army was protecting its stout ramparts, which was why, at least by the time Steapa left, the Danes had made no attempt to attack it. “Haesten was clever,” I said.

“Clever?” Steapa asked.

“He persuaded the Northumbrians to attack by saying he’d distract Alfred’s army,” I explained, “and then he warned Alfred of the Northumbrian attack to make sure he didn’t have to fight the West Saxons.”

“He has to fight us,” Steapa growled.

“Because Alfred is just as clever,” I said. Alfred knew Haesten was the greater threat. If Haesten could be defeated then the Northumbrians would lose heart and, in all likelihood, sail away. Ragnar’s Northumbrians had to be held at bay, which is why so much of the West Saxon army was in Defnascir, but Alfred had sent his son and twelve hundred of his best men to Beamfleot. He wanted me to weaken Haesten, but he wanted much more than that.

He wanted the Ætheling Edward’s reputation to be burnished by the victory. Alfred had not needed to sent the Ætheling. Steapa and his men were indispensable to me, while Edward was a liability, but
Alfred knew his own death could not be too distant and he wanted to be certain that his son succeeded him, and for that he needed to give Edward a warrior’s renown. Which is why he had asked me to give Edward my oath and I reflected bitterly that my refusal had not prevented Alfred from manipulating me so that I was here, fighting for the Christians and fighting for Edward.

The Ætheling at last entered the fort, his arrival announced by horn blasts. Men knelt as he rode to the hall and I watched him acknowledge the homage with graceful waves of his right hand. He looked young and slight, and I remembered Ragnar asking if I wanted to be King of Wessex and I could not resist a sudden, bitter laugh. Finan glanced at me curiously. “He’ll want us in the hall,” Steapa said.

The big hall stank. The servants had shoveled the horse dung to one side, and raked out most of the stale floor-rushes, but the hall still reeked like a latrine and buzzed with fat flies. I had feasted here once, back when the hall was lit by fire and loud with laughter and the memory made me wonder if all the great high-beamed feasting halls were doomed to decay.

There was no dais, so Edward’s chair was set on a great rug and next to him was a stool on which Æthelflæd sat. Behind the brother and sister was a dark group of priests. I knew none of them, but they evidently knew me because four of the six churchmen made the sign of the cross when I approached the makeshift throne.

Steapa knelt to the Ætheling, Finan bowed, and I nodded my head. Edward evidently expected more obeisance from me and waited, but when it was plain that I had offered him all I was prepared to give he forced a smile. “You did well,” he said in his high voice. There was neither warmth nor conviction in the compliment.

I slapped Steapa’s back. “Steapa did well, lord.”

“He is a loyal warrior and a good Christian,” Edward said, implying that I was neither.

“He’s also a big ugly brute,” I said, “and he makes Danes shit themselves with fear.”

Edward and the priests all bridled at that. Edward was steeling
himself to reprove me when Æthelflæd’s laughter cut across the hall. Edward looked annoyed at the sound, but composed himself. “I am sorry that the Lord Ælfwold died,” he said.

“I share your sorrow, lord.”

“My father,” he said, “has sent me to capture this nest of heathen pirates.” He spoke in the same way that he sat; stiffly. He was horribly conscious of his youth and of his fragile authority, but, like his father, he had intelligent eyes. He was lost in this hall, though. He was frightened of my blood-spattered face, and frightened of most of the older warriors who had been killing Danes when he was still sucking on his wet nurse’s tits. “The question,” he said, “is how.”

“Steapa already has the answer,” I said.

Edward looked relieved and Steapa looked alarmed. “Speak, Steapa,” Edward said.

Steapa looked at me in fright so I answered for him. “We have to cross the moat and climb the wall,” I said, “and we can only do that at low tide, and the Danes know it. They also know we have to do it quickly.”

There was silence. I had stated the obvious and that clearly disappointed Edward, but what did he expect? That I would have some sorcerous scheme born from pagan wiles? Or did he believe angels would fly from the Christian heaven and attack the Danes inside the fort? There were only two ways to capture Beamfleot. One was to starve the Danes, and we did not have the time to do that, and the other was to storm the walls. Sometimes, in war, simple is the only answer. It is also likely to be a blood-soaked answer, and all the men in the hall knew it. Some looked at me reproachfully, imagining the horror of trying to scale a high palisade manned by murderous Danes. “So,” I went on confidently, “we need to be busy. Weohstan,” I turned to him, “your men will patrol the marshes to stop messengers leaving the fort. Beornoth, take Lord Ælfwold’s men and threaten the ship-forts at the creek’s end. You, lord,” I looked at Edward, “your men must start making ladders, and you,” I pointed at the six priests, “what are you good for?”